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Catalyst 3550 Multilayer Switch Software Configuration Guide
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Chapter6 Administering the Swi tc h Optimizing System Resources for User-Selected Features

Displaying Address Table Entries

You can display the MAC address table by using one or more of the privileged EXEC commands
described in Table 6 -5:
Optimizing System Resources for User-Selected Features
By using Switch Database Management (SDM) templates, you can configure memory resources in the
switch to optimize support for specific features, depending on how the swit ch i s used i n you r n etw ork.
You can select one of four templates to specify how system resources are allocated. You can then
approximate the maximum number of unicast MAC addresse s, In tern et Grou p M ana ge ment Prot ocol
(IGMP) groups, quality of service (QoS) access control entries (ACEs), security ACEs, unicast routes,
multicast routes, subnet VLANs (routed interfaces), and Layer 2 VLA Ns t hat can b e c onfi gur ed on t he
switch.
The four templates prioritize system memory to optimize support for these types of features:
•QoS and security ACEs—The access template might typically be used in an access switch at the
network edge where the route table sizes might not be substantial. Filtering and QoS might be more
important because an access switch is the entry to the whole network.
•Routing—The routing template maximizes system resources for unicast routing, typically required
for a router or aggregator in the center of a network.
•VLANs—The VLAN template disables routing and supports the maximum number of uni cast MAC
addresses. It would typically be selected for a Catalyst 3550 used as a Layer 2 switch.
•Default—The default template gives balance to all functionalities (QoS, ACLs, unicast routing,
multicast routing, VLANs and MAC addresses).
Table 6 -6 lists the approximate number of each resource supported in each of the four templates for
Catalyst 3550 Gigabit Ethernet switches. Tab le 6-7 compares the four templates for a Catalyst 3550
switch with primarily Fast Ethernet ports.
The first six rows in the tables (unicast MAC addresses through multicast routes) represent approximate
hardware boundaries set when a template is selected. If a section of a hardware resource is full, all
processing overflow is sent to the CPU, seriously impacting swit ch pe rf orma nce.
The last two rows, the total number of routed ports an d SVI s a nd the nu mb er of L ay er 2 V LANs , a re
guidelines used to calculate hardware resource consumption related to the othe r resource parame ters.
Table6-5 Commands for Displaying the MAC Address Table
Command Description
show mac-address-table address Displays MAC address table information for the specified MAC address.
show mac-address-table aging-time Displays the aging time in all VLANs or the specified VLAN.
show mac-address-table count Displays the number of addresses present in all VLANs or the specified VLAN.
show mac-address-table dynamic Displays dynamic MAC address table entries only.
show mac-address-table interface Displays the MAC address table information for the specified interface.
show mac-address-table multicast Displays the Layer 2 multicast entries for all VLANs or the specified VLAN.
show mac-address-table static Displays static MAC address table entries only.
show mac-address-table vlan Displays the MAC address table information for the specified VLAN.